One of Insurance Commissioner John King’s central criticisms of U.S. Sen. Jon Ossoff, whom he hopes to unseat in next year’s Senate race, centers around the botched U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan.
According to King, Ossoff and U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock ignored his calls when he was trying to help Afghans flee before the nation fell in the hands of the Taliban. However, documents shared by both senators challenge King’s narrative that they were unresponsive in the summer of 2021, as first reported by 11 Alive news.
Despite records showing the senators communicated with King amid the chaos in Afghanistan, representatives for King’s campaign say his complaint about Ossoff and Warnock remains. King claims he was unable to reach Georgia’s senators as he worked hard to assist people there whose lives were in danger in the crucial days before the fall of Kabul on Aug. 15, 2021.
By the time they did begin communicating with King, a major general with the Army National Guard who was deployed to Afghanistan in 2010, it was too little, too late, his campaign now says.
King described the matter with less nuance last month on The Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s “Politically Georgia” podcast and in an interview on 11 Alive’s “The Georgia Voter” show.
“I called brand new Sen. Ossoff; I called Sen. Warnock,” King told the AJC. “Neither one would even return my call. I was upset.”
Warnock and Ossoff were both sworn into office on Jan. 20, 2021. The withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan negotiated by President Donald Trump during his first term and implemented under President Joe Biden shortly after his inauguration, destabilized that nation and put hundreds of Afghanis who had assisted allies at risk.
The White House and virtually every member of Congress was inundated with calls and requests for help.
Records supplied by Warnock’s office showed a member of his staff reaching out to King on Aug. 16, 2021. King responded and copied additional staff members to continue the conversation.
King sent a formal letter to Ossoff on Aug. 24, 2021, listing the names of individuals and their family members he hoped to help get evacuated. Two days later, King’s director of communications and legislative affairs wrote to a top Ossoff staffer that the two politicians had been working well together in the days prior.
“Thank you for all of the help from your office over the past few days,” Weston Burleson wrote. “Commissioner King said he and Senator Ossoff have had several productive conversations since last night.”
Ossoff’s and Warnock’s teams released the emails to refute King’s claim that they never contacted him to discuss the issues in Afghanistan.
But King’s campaign says that correspondence came days after he made repeated attempts to reach the senators by phone with no response. The day after Kabul fell, King aired his frustration in an interview with WSB and during a discussion on conservative radio host Erick Erikson’s podcast.
“No response from our senators,” King told Erickson. “I’m really, really trying not to be political, but I’m disappointed.”
By that time, it was too late to help the people King feared had been left to die, his campaign said more recently.
King’s representatives said the cordial emails between staffers were the result of a relatively new statewide officeholder trying not to burn bridges in Washington. King was appointed as state insurance commissioner in 2019.
“Our office takes our relationships with members of Congress very seriously, so we always treat them with respect,” said Martin Sullivan, King’s chief of staff. “But the time it took to get in communication with them, it was very frustrating for the commissioner.”
Both Ossoff, who is on paternity leave, and Warnock, declined to comment about the back-and-forth with King and the statements he made regarding the summer of 2021. Their representatives said the emails demonstrating communication with King speak for themselves.
Correction: This story has been corrected to show that the fall of Kabul and the emails between Commissioner John King and U.S. Sens. Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock occurred during August 2021.
Credit: AJC file photo
Credit: AJC file photo
Credit: Jason Getz / Jason.Getz@ajc.com
Credit: Jason Getz / Jason.Getz@ajc.com
Credit: Jason Getz/AJC
Credit: Jason Getz/AJC
Credit: Jason Getz/AJC
Credit: Jason Getz/AJC
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